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The most active thread yesterday was titled, "Sooo am I just the best parent ever or are the others complete duds?" and posted in the "General Parenting Discussion" forum. The original poster is very proud of herself because she just completed a 3 hour flight with her preschool and elementary school-aged children. She had packed lots of games and engaged her children constantly during the flight. Meanwhile she noticed that other kids on the airplane were all using iPads while their parents used their phones. The original poster feels she is superior to the other parents because she used the travel time for talking and engaging with her kids while the other parents did not. The original poster did not post again until the 13th page of the thread at which point she criticized DCUM posters as "screen-addicted parents with screen-addicted kids". In terms of the replies, one of the posters responding basically did my job for me by writing a lengthy post that described the types of replies the thread received. I'll just crib some points from that post. As the poster noted, there was not agreement among posters about what constituted "good parenting". Many posters considered that good parenting was determined by how little their children bothered other passengers. In this regard, providing a child with a iPad and headphones is great parenting if it keeps the child quiet and still during the flight. Other posters, including the original poster, based their judgement on what they believed to be best for the child. But members of this group were not in complete agreement with each other because there were differences of opinion about what was best for the child. The original poster believes that engagement with a parent is best while others have different ideas, including the suggestion that using an iPad might be best. Another group of posters prioritized what is best for the parent. Because travelling can be stressful and parents, especially moms, are expected to not only plan and pack for themselves, but the children as well, the plane ride may be the only time parents will have to relex and de-stress. An iPad can help distract the kids while the parents have a break. The bottom line is that almost all posters beyond the original poster and a very few others view children using iPads on airplanes as potentially good parenting, rather than bad as the original poster believes. This includes posters whose families are "screen-free" in most other circumstances, but make allowances for air travel. As you would expect, there are plenty of posts that are critical of the original poster who is considered "judgemental", a "troll", and someone who likely has parenting failures as well and probably shouldn't be so smug. More than one poster noted that for all of her criticism of screens and screen-addicted adults, the original poster was using a screen to post on DCUM and appeared to be quite familiar with the website, suggesting frequent screen use. But, I'm sure the original poster can quit at any time.